Predicting Airborne Infection Risk: Association Between Personal Ambient Carbon Dioxide Level Monitoring and Incidence of Tuberculosis Infection in South African Health Workers.

Background: High rates of tuberculosis (TB) transmission occur in hospitals in high-incidence countries, yet there is no validated way to evaluate the impact of hospital design and function on airborne infection risk. We hypothesized that personal ambient carbon dioxide (CO2) monitoring could serve as a surrogate measure of rebreathed air exposure associated with TB infection risk in health workers (HWs).

Methods: We analyzed baseline and repeat (12-month) interferon-γ release assay (IGRA) results in 138 HWs in Cape Town, South Africa.

"If I've got latent TB, I would like to get rid of it": Derivation of the CARD (Constraints, Actions, Risks, and Desires) Framework informed by South African healthcare worker perspectives on latent tuberculosis treatment.

Background: Healthcare workers (HWs) have at least twice the risk of tuberculosis (TB) compared to the general population. There is growing emphasis on latent TB infection (LTBI) in high-risk populations. Yet we know little about HWs' perspectives of LTBI testing and treatment to inform implementation in high-incidence settings.

Hard choices: Ethical challenges in phase 1 of COVID-19 vaccine roll-out in South Africa.

Access to COVID-19 vaccines has raised concerns globally. Despite calls for solidarity and social justice during the pandemic, vaccine nationalism, stockpiling of limited vaccine supplies by high-income countries and profit-driven strategies of global pharmaceutical manufacturers have brought into sharp focus global health inequities and the plight of low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) as they wait in line for restricted tranches of vaccines. Even in high-income countries that received vaccine supplies first, vaccine roll-out globally has been fraught with logistic and ethical challenges.

Leadership and early strategic response to the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic at a COVID-19 designated hospital in South Africa.

While many countries are preparing to face the COVID-19 pandemic, the reported cases in Africa remain low. With a high burden of both communicable and non-communicable disease and a resource-constrained public healthcare system, sub-Saharan Africa is preparing for the coming crisis as best it can. We describe our early response as a designated COVID-19 provincial hospital in Cape Town, South Africa (SA).

Synthetic, biological and composite scaffolds for abdominal wall reconstruction.

The reconstruction of abdominal wall defects remains a huge surgical challenge. Tension-free repair is proven to be superior to suture repair in abdominal wall reconstruction. Scaffolds are essential for tension-free repair.

In vitro maturation and fertilization of oocytes recovered from free-ranging Burchell's zebra (Equus burchelli) and Hartmann's zebra (Equus zebra hartmannae).

A noninvasive repeatable method to harvest oocytes for in vitro fertilization (IVF) could potentially be used to assist reproduction in endangered equid species. The objectives of this study were to evaluate a specific transvaginal ultrasound-guided oocyte recovery procedure for use in zebra mares and the general applicability of IVF procedures in zebra. Ovaries were collected from Burchell's zebra (Equus burchelli) and Hartmann's zebra (Equus zebra hartmannae) mares at routine culling for Expt.

The effect of seminal plasma on human sperm-zona pellucida binding.

The aim of this study was to determine the effect of different concentrations of seminal plasma (SP) in insemination medium on human sperm-zona pellucida (ZP) binding. The effects of fresh SP [50% (n = 10) and 1% (n = 9)], frozen-thawed versus fresh SP [5% (n = 10)] and frozen-thawed SP [5% (n = 10) and 1% (n = 9)] on sperm-ZP binding were examined using hemizona assays. The validity of the hemizona assay as performed in this study was also examined.